Thirty Minutes And Counting
by SpellCleaver
Summary: "Surprise?" When Clary went to Isabelle's surprise birthday party, she never thought the day would involve her scheming friends tricking her into spending half an hour in a bathroom with Jace Herondale, which ended in a way she never expected. Now she's enjoying what came of her little rendezvous, she thinks it only fair that she returns the favour... AH Clace & Sizzy Three-shot
1. That Would Be Perfect

**I started writing this in May, since I went to a friend's surprise birthday party and we genuinely had to hide in a bathroom... I'm surprised at how long it took.**

 **Disclaimer: I only own the plot. None of the characters.**

* * *

The Lightwoods had always had a taste for flair, and this was displayed in the sheer impressiveness of their home.

It was fairly large and bulky, with a garden completely surrounding the house, enclosed by high hedges. A paved, straight path led from the gate to the door in a no-nonsense fashion typical of Maryse. Lots of windows speckled the walls on every one of the four stories (excluding the basement), every one of them wide open with white lace curtains fluttering like butterflies in the wind. The overall effect was that Clary felt very small standing awkwardly in the shadow of the imposing doorway as she pulled the handle to ring the bell.

The door opened quickly to reveal Maryse, Isabelle's mother. Clary wasn't sure whose idea it had been to throw Isabelle a surprise birthday party, but Maryse had taken it into her stride remarkable well and had been working feverishly to make it perfect ever since the thought had been brought up.

"Oh good, you're here." The woman gushed, ushering the stiff redhead inside and taking from her the neatly wrapped present and tin of freshly baked cookies. "Magnus texted recently; he said that he and Alec had managed to stall her in a random clothes store."

"How much needs to be done?" She asked, looking around. With Alec and his boyfriend tasked with the job of distracting Isabelle, that left Maryse, Robert, Max, Simon, Clary, and Jace to set up. Only immediate family and close friends had been invited to the party, so then it would be easier to keep it a secret. Besides, Isabelle - despite being a bright social butterfly - secretly did like having small gatherings.

"Not much; it's only a small celebration," came the answer. "Simon and Max disappeared somewhere to discuss manga, and Robert and I are laying out the food on the table. If you could help Jace with the balloons that would be great."

Clary nodded. As she moved towards the back of the kitchen, she shed her green jacket and carefully buried it under the mess in the Lightwoods' shoe closet. It was hot and she couldn't leave it out or Isabelle would recognise it. She noticed Jace's bag he had presumably brought his stuff in lying out in the open, and mentally reminded herself to nag him about that.

Ducking through the door that led into the dining room, she took in the sight and stifled a laugh. Jace Herondale stood staring at the dining table, which was littered with empty, neon-coloured balloons. He held a blown up yellow one with the end pinched between his fingers, and was gazing puzzled at a green one that had already been tied.

"Need any help?" She asked smugly, laughter ringing in her voice. He turned a lost expression on her, then scowled at her smirk.

"These are impossible to tie," he insisted vehemently, waving the one in his right hand around. "I try, and then there's a whoosh as the air starts escaping."

She giggled at that and swiped a pink one from the table. "How hard can it be?" She countered. His expression only darkened.

She blew into the balloon as hard as she could, but it barely inflated, and deflated again before she could take another breath. She didn't need to look to see the grin on Jace's face. Mentally flipping him off, she blew again. It failed again.

He whistled. "Need a little help there, Red?"

"Don't call me 'Red'." She snapped. "Especially when you know perfectly well what my name is." His only response was to stick his tongue out at her. She rolled her eyes. "But yes, I do need help." She loathed to admit it, but held out the balloon to him.

He took it nimbly with his left hand and handed her the untied yellow one expectantly. Without a word she took it, trying not to curl her fingers at the rush of heat the physical contact gave her. There had always been tension between her and Jace - Isabelle liked to call it 'sexual tension'. Clary disagreed.

She did _not_ like Jace Herondale. No way. Not ever.

With ease, he inflated the pink one. "How did you fail at this? It's so _easy_."

She rolled her eyes for the umpteenth time. "My lungs are smaller than yours!" She argued back defensively.

They fell into a routine, with him blowing them up, and her tying them. Finally, Simon and Max turned up again innocently asking whether there was anymore work to be done, though their self-satisfied smiles betrayed that they knew there wasn't. Resigned to a wait until Isabelle came back, they all took seats at the table, half-heartedly batting balloons at each other. Simon came in and handed around the cupcakes of the batch Maryse had made that hadn't turned out too well, and Clary made sure to smear the last scraps of icing left in the tub over the top of hers before devouring it with such impressive ferocity it earned her a raised eyebrow from Jace.

Finally, they all heard the _ding!_ of Maryse's phone going off. Isabelle's mother came in and read it, a small smile gracing her features. "Alec says that they've started walking back now." She glanced up at the kids.

Clary's eyebrows furrowed. "Walking back from where?"

Jace faced her and said very pompously, like she was stupid "Well, they went into town, so-"

"I know that," she interrupted. He sat back, looking the slightest bit dejected. "I mean, are they walking back right from town, or have they caught the bus and are walking back from the bus stop?"

Jace and Simon just sat there, opening and closing their mouths like fish, before finally turning to Maryse for the answer. Her expression screamed _I don't know_.

"Well then," Clary said calmly. "We might as well sort out our hiding places in the meantime." She glanced around to receive everyone's approving nods as confirmation. "I'll take the shoe closet-"

"No," Simon interrupted. At Jace and Clary's confused glances, he elaborated. "How are we all meant to fit in there?"

That just baffled Clary more. "I'm the only one who's going in there." She pointed out slowly.

He shook his head. "We should all hide in the same place."

Cue the still-bemused silence. It was his own fault for being so cryptic. "Why?!" Her voice clearly betrayed her impatience and irritation. He huffed, rolling his eyes again, but before he could speak, Jace seemed to catch on and explained for him.

"Well, for one thing, if we all hide together we can at least entertain each other should we end up hiding for two hours. And also, if we hide together we don't have to worry about someone else giving the game away by shouting 'surprise!' too early. We can all jump out together."

She crinkled her nose. "I hate your inarguable logic."

"You love me," he winked, flashing his golden smile that had so many girls falling for him at school. Only for once, it was more smile than smirk.

She spared a brief moment before she followed Jace to wonder why her heart was racing. Did she have arrhythmia?

.

.

.

"A _bathroom?"_ Clary tried to raise one eyebrow at him, failed, and raised two instead. "Seriously?"

Simon shrugged, grinning like an idiot. Clary was finding his behaviour suspicious, but she had no idea what he could be up to. "If you can find another suitable hiding place big enough for all three of us, by all means we'll use that. Otherwise, here we are."

"Idiot," Jace muttered from where he was leaning against the wall opposite the two of them. The bathroom - unlike the extravagance of the rest of the Lightwood household - was fairly average, if one overlooked it's colossal size. It had a white bath, which Clary and Simon were currently sitting on the edge of, a towel rack, a small ledge to hold soaps, toothbrushes and toothpastes, and a sink, which Jace was leaning against. The toilet was situated between the bath and the sink.

Jace cocked his head at Simon, but didn't comment. For once his face was blank, without a hint of arrogance or cockiness. Clary absently wondered how often he was seen like this.

She realised, with a sudden pang, that she didn't actually know much about him. Sure, she knew that he was Alec's best friend, and that he was practically a brother to Isabelle, and that he was a player who practically ruled the school ( _everyone_ knew that) but, despite the abundance of times he'd teased her at school or at the Lightwood's house, and just how often she saw him across the corridor, she didn't really know much about him.

He turned his gaze then, to catch her staring at him. She ducked her head and blushed, too quickly to see the uncertain smile that flitted across his lips.

Without warning, Simon, in two strides, was suddenly over from his position in the corner to standing in front of the door and fiddling with the lock. Clary sprung to follow him and grabbed his hand before he turned it. "What are you doing?!"

Her best friend surveyed her calmly. "Do you want Max or Robert to come barging in, having forgotten we're in here?"

With a slight shudder, Clary shook her head, releasing her grip on his hand. Jace watched the proceedings with one golden eyebrow raised.

"Okay," Simon said as the two of them settled into their original places. "What shall we do to pass the time?"

Jace shrugged, and said the first words he had in a little while. She wasn't sure whether his silence was uncharacteristic or not. "How about truth or consequence?"

"I'll go first!" She declared before they'd even decided on it. She whirled on Simon, who seemed slightly caught off guard. "Were you ever actually planning on returning the Harry Potter DVD's to me?"

Simon's eyes widened. "And the consequence?"

Clary thought for a moment. "You have to abstain from talking or communicating to anyone in any way for the next three days."

Simon swallowed. Everyone knew what a chatterbox he could be when he wanted to. "Fine then, the answer is: I was planning on waiting until you'do forgotten about them, then slipping them into your DVD cabinet at home."

She narrowed her eyes and opened her mouth, but was interrupted by a loud guffaw. Jace was bent over double, laughing so hard it looked painful.

"What?" The two squawked in unison, indignation scrawled across their faces. Clary put her hand on the spot where her hip should have been, had she not had such a boyish figure. Jace sobered up slightly, straightening up again, then his buttery eyes latched onto the contorted expression Clary wore as an outcome of her strained efforts to raise an eyebrow, and he was down again, hearty chuckles wracking his torso.

"What is that expression?!" He choked out, tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. "You look like you're trying to give birth to a coconut!"

She took a startled step back from where she'd risen in outrage, tilting her head and giving him her best _Are you absolutely mental?_ look. " _Giving birth to a coconut?!_ Where the hell did you get that simile from?"

He unfolded himself again, actually considering her question. "I don't know," came the answer. He shrugged, an amused smile tugging the corners of his mouth up. One went up before the other, she noticed, and then chastised herself, with no idea _why_ she'd noticed that. "It just popped out," Jace continued, oblivious that Clary's confusion had found a different source. "My mind comes up with strange things."

"Pervert," she muttered, before flinging herself back onto her perch on the bath rim. However, in her frustration she overestimated the amount of force needed, and her momentum made sure that within seconds she'd toppled over and was sprawled in the bathtub directly beneath the shower nozzle, legs flailing uselessly in the air above her.

"Don't even think about it, Simon Lewis," she warned in a deadly tone, as she spied her best friend's hand inching towards the dial that turned the shower on. At her scathing look, his arm sagged and he drew it back grumbling. She turned the look on Jace, whose renewed laughter died instantaneously. She nodded in satisfaction.

"Good," she said. She held her arms out in mid air. "Now can someone please help me up?"

To her surprise, it was Jace who did, his grip more gentle than she would have expected from him, though she wasn't quite sure _what_ she would have expected from him. Either way, it wasn't what she got.

He held onto her hands a beat longer, before Clary dropped his like she'd been electrocuted. Simon's scrutinising stare was burning holes in her already burning face. "So!" She said loudly and brightly, shattering the awkward silence into a million remnants that still clung onto every one of her actions and words. She turned to Simon and smiled wickedly. "Your turn to ask the question."

.

.

.

"You're joking." Clary said, disbelief etched onto her face as she stared at Jace open mouthed.

The blonde in question pursed his lips, shaking his head. "I'm not," he insisted defensively. "They are terrifying beasts ready to peck your eyes out! Never go near one!"

The redhead turned to lock gazes with Simon, whose face was a bizarre blend of shock, glee, and the twisting of the features one gets when they're trying to hold back a snort. The expression in itself was almost as funny as Jace's absolutely ridiculous declaration.

As the truth of it sunk in - Jace was actually serious - Clary's knees crumpled and she clung to the side of the bath for support, her loud giggles bouncing off of the pristine walls and becoming distorted in the small space. She thought she'd never seen anyone more disgruntled than she saw Jace in that moment.

"It's. Not. Funny." He forced out through gritted teeth, and Clary's laughter only intensified as she spotted the dark red flush creeping up the side of his neck. He glared at her, eyes burning with the energy of the suns they resembled, and she did her best to sober up, forcing herself to recount the incident.

"If that's not funny then I don't know what is." She declared, still smiling lopsidedly, as she stood up again. "An innocent question for our game: What's your biggest fear? Here I am, expecting you to answer something sensible or rational, like heights, or spiders, or even the dark!" She'd unconsciously increased in volume, her arms waving passionately.

"Why would I be afraid of heights when I'm this tall?" He asked, gesturing at his imposing frame, voice half-annoyed and half-confused.

She ignored him as she carried on with her recount. "But no. Instead, you reply with the most unexpected phobia in the world, and then try to justify it!"

"It's not a phobia," he growled, eyes still fixed on her. "It's a perfectly rational fear. They are terrifying." Clary went to share an astounded glance with Simon, but failed, because for some unknown reason her friend was staring at his phone, typing something in. She turned back to bicker with Jace some more.

"Oh yes," she drawled sarcastically, "it's perfectly rational. That explains why you see people running around the park screaming whenever one of the poor ducks decides to go for a wander." She paused for a moment and snorted, covering her face with her hands. She could feel Jace's death glare scorching the crown of her head. When she looked back up, it hadn't lessened a fraction, but one side of his mouth was curled in a half smile. _"Why_ are you afraid of them anyway? Did a duck try to eat you as a child?" She thought for a second. "Come to think of it, that could actually be quite scarring."

" _No_ ," he bit back, drawing the vowel into the tone that indicates one is meticulously explaining that would be painfully obvious to anyone else. "It was a story my dad told me. He and his brother, William, and Will's best friend, went to the park one day and bought some pies. When they passed by the duck pond, they fed some of it to the ducks, before realising that the pie had duck _in_ it. When they tried to dissuade the ducks from eating their generous offerings, their efforts proved fruitless, and led to them being chased away. Therefore, they amassed proof that ducks are bloodthirsty, cannibalistic animals." He touched the back of his hand to his forehead in an overly dramatic gesture of distress. "And one must stay well away."

"Uh huh." Clary nodded to show she'd heard. Apparently Jace doubted her conviction, because he treated her to another glare.

"Actually, Clary's right," Simon piped up at that moment, still looking at his phone. Then his eyes slid from the screen and found Clary's, before travelling on Jace. "It's a phobia. It's officially called..." he squinted at the screen. " _'Anatidaephobia is defined as a pervasive, irrational fear that one is being watched by a duck. The anatidaephobic individual fears that no matter where they are, or what they're doing, a duck watches.'_ " He looked back up at Jace. "Clary was also right about how ridiculous it is."

Jace staggered back, pressing his hand to his heart. "You cruel people!" He cried, pretending to sob. "You mock my fear!"

"Yes," Clary stated, and she felt the ripple of amusement travel from her to him and back and back again. His mouth tilted up in a smile. "We do."

.

.

.

It was shortly after that that the doorknob was twisted firmly and someone attempted to open the door, but due to Simon locking it again, it resisted. Then came three sharp knocks and Maryse's voice seeped though the wood, "Can you open the door?"

Clary hastened to do so, and the door swung inwards to show Isabelle's mother silhouetted in the doorway. "Simon," she said, slightly worried. "Isabelle called to ask if I wanted her to pick up some milk for later in the week, and Max accidentally let slip that you were here, and had been talking to him about manga. You'll want to come out, so she won't be suspicious when she comes home and you're not here."

Simon nodded. "Okay." He treated Clary and Jace to a suspicious stare. "Don't... break anything," he said dismissively. He pointed at Clary sternly. "I know what you're like."

"You caught me," she replied very dry, and he tossed her a quick smile as he exited the room.

Jace immediately shut - but didn't lock, for whatever reason - the door again, and leaned his back up against it, stance casual despite the awkwardness he surveyed Clary with. The tension was palpable. "So," he tried out experimentally. "Still doing truth or consequence?"

She shrugged. "Why not." She didn't phrase it as a question though, and waved a hand at him. "Your turn."

He appeared to think over it for a moment, eyes searching her face for something she didn't think she had. She swallowed as he opened his mouth, then closed it, looking strangely conflicted, then opened it again. She closed her eyes and pressed backwards until the sink dug into the small of her back, hands at her sides clenched into fists...

"Do you honestly find me attractive?"

Her eyes flew open from shock, and so did her mouth, her jaw hanging like a conker on a string. "What?!" She asked first, trying to comprehend the motive behind asking that question. Her fists unclenched and fell limp. " _Why?_ "

His eyelids were half-lowered, eyes shadowed, and his face as blank as an empty document looks when you're trying to write an essay. She would think that this meant he didn't care, but living with Jonathan as her brother, who didn't like showing his emotions, she knew it wasn't that. It was that he couldn't show whatever he was feeling for fear of weakness. An inexplicable surge of protectiveness washed over her like a wave, telling her to comfort him somehow.

Instead, she answered his question.

 _"Um,"_ she said, drawing out the consonant. Shutters seemed to go up in Jace's eyes. She scratched the back of her neck. "I- I never really considered that." She considered it. "I guess, yeah, you're kind of attractive, I just generally prefer to look at a person's personality rather than their face and I'm rambling this is really awkward I'm sorry." She stopped then, sighing in a way that seemed conflicted between hopelessness for her social skills and relief at not having to strain her knotted tongue any more.

Jace nodded. She noticed then, that he looked just as awkward as she felt, fiddling with his bottom lip and periodically clenching and unclenching his jaw. "I see," he said. The silence that fell after that was smothering.

After what felt like an eternity of thoughts spinning every which way, she grimaced. "I'm-I'm sorry if I made it awkward." She blurted, scrunching her eyes shut.

"Nothing to be sorry about," he grunted in response.

They looked at each other a moment longer. "Can we just pretend this never happened?"

He looked relieved beyond measure. "That would be perfect."

.

.

.

They'd sat in silence for a bit, then they talked about anything and everything, just small talk that ended with the two of them no closer but no further away from each other. Jace frequently glanced at his watch and commented how Isabelle had taken at least forty minutes by now, and the two of them had jokingly imagined what Alec and Magnus could be doing to slow her down.

"Maybe she didn't need slowing down," Clary pointed out from where she was sitting in the bath, legs hanging over the side like it was the arm of an armchair. "This is Isabelle we're talking about here. All you have to do is walk her past a clothes store and she'll drag you in."

Jace chuckled. It was warm, low kind of sound. "Or shoe store. Or jewellery store." Clary nodded in agreement as Jace shifted his position from where he'd had his legs crossed demurely with his back as erect and straight as a ruler, to slouching against the bathroom wall, with his legs sprawled out lazily in front of him. With his dominating height, then practically reached halfway across the Lightwoods' bathroom.

"Imagine if she came in right now and I'd accidentally left my jacket outside in plain sight." She chuckled to herself at the thought, but with a pang that all of their work in setting up the surprise party would have been wasted. "Isabelle's too bright to not notice it."

Jace nodded grimly. "You're right. And then everything would be ruined, and it would all be your fault."

She scrunched up her nose. "Wow. Harsh, aren't you?"

He nodded solemnly, then proceeded to stick his tongue out at her. She reciprocated the gesture.

"By the way," he said idly in the charged silence that followed. "You have icing on your face."

She whirled on him. "What! Since when?" She took her sleeve and dabbed furiously all over her face, until she realised she didn't want to ruin her nice blouse. Instead she propelled herself off the floor to have a look in the mirror, partly so she could find it, and partly to determine whether or not Jace was lying.

Jace wasn't lying. A tiny splotch of chocolate icing was smeared like a fingerprint about a centimetre from the left corner of her mouth. She ran the tap and used the water to splash on her face. "Why didn't you tell me?!"

He chuckled. "It's been on there since we ate the cupcakes Maryse went wrong with. I just didn't want to tell you because you seemed so oblivious it was almost adorable." She flushed dark red and dabbed some more water on her face to cool it down. She must have done it quite wildly, because a drop flew out and hit Jace from where he was still lounging on the floor. "Hey!" Came the cry. When he looked back up to see Clary drying her hands on the towel to the side, he commented "You're lucky you didn't splash any on your clothes. That's a really nice blouse."

She blushed again, though not as heavily as before; it was more of a barely there pink tinge. "Thanks," she muttered, meeting her own eyes in the mirror. She'd bought the blouse specifically for this occasion, since she and Izzy had been walking past a shop the week before and her friend had begged her to get it, saying it was the perfect blend between their tastes and looking willing to blackmail her into it. "As an early birthday present for me," Isabelle had said, then Clary had caved and bought it to wear here specifically, so her friend could have a pleasant surprise.

It was made of cotton, and it was a white, but embroidered with tiny birds, the stitches starting with an emerald green at the top, before flooding into a rich teal above the hips, and flowed into a dark blue at the bottom. It hit her mid-thigh, like a short dress, and was slightly cinched at the waist. Clary had worn it with a pair of navy leggings, and her cap of curls seemed even brighter in contrast to the cool colours.

She blushed further, then stepped away from the mirror to resume her seating arrangement. But as she stepped her heel came into contact with Jace's outstretched legs and then she was falling, before she collided with the tiled floor with a _thump_.

Jace scrambled onto his knees hastily, pale eyes blown wide. "Clary?" He asked, reaching out. "Are you alright?" Before she had the chance to reply, he continued, "Wow, you really are clumsy aren't you?"

"You're the one with the freakishly long legs, Rumpelstiltskin." She retorted, before sitting up swiftly, only to have her skull collide with Jace's as he bent over her in concern. "Ow," she whimpered, cradling her head and glaring at him at the same time.

Then it hit her just how close they were in proximity. Noses at most separated by two inches of space, she could feel every breath he took as it rushed over her cheek. She saw the bob of his Adam's apple as he swallowed and her breath was hooked in her throat.

Did he lean in? She couldn't tell. She wanted him to lean in. Her head hurt, and the room spun, but that was one thought she managed to pick off the carousel in her mind. _She wanted him to lean in_.

She couldn't move herself. She was petrified, but she wasn't sure why. She could see the faint lattice of capillaries in her retina superimposed over her vision as the threads pulsed with the blood rushing to her head. She dimly registered Jace's lips leaning in to capture her own, and then she was aware of nothing _but_ Jace, but everything _about_ Jace.

She felt his hands, tentative at first, as they came to rest at the juncture of her shoulder blades, and then he was tilting her forwards until the kiss deepened. She braced her palms on the floor before she rose into a crouch, and shyly placed her left hand on his chest, and letting the other rest lightly on his shoulder. She felt the fire that seemed to be shooting through her veins, and every brush of breath or air against her exposed skin sent shivering tingles down her spine.

In a sudden surge of courage she let her arms snake round Jace's neck and pulled him down, closer, until there wasn't enough space for a sheet of paper to reside between them. In retaliation he slipped a hand through her crimson curls, and she shuddered against him. All the while they kept kissing.

Then the door to the bathroom opened.

The undeniably imposing figure of Isabelle Lightwood stood surveying them as they broke apart, gasping. Had the door opened? They hadn't heard it, certainly. Obviously. Clary twisted round to look. After an instant a broad grin lit her carved features and she squealed loudly enough to wake the people in the churchyard the next town over, and started rambling. Her words sailed right over Clary's head without comprehension. Jace awkwardly got to his feet, and offered Clary a hand to stand with, which she took. Isabelle's eyes fixed on their intertwined hands and she squealed louder.

Eventually her squealing attracted the unwanted attention of Simon Lewis, who stood agape at Jace and Clary's swollen lips. The redhead wanted to hide behind her now messy curtain of hair - she'd definitely be camouflaged, what with her face's incessant efforts to imitate a tomato - but she forced herself not to. Instead she took in, with some confusion, as Simon dropped a few coins into Isabelle's waiting open palm.

Jace scratched the back of his neck, and Clary cast her eyes to the tiled floor.

"Surprise?"

* * *

 **This was originally meant to be about a thousand words more, but I changed the plotline, so this happened.**

 **What did you think? Review?**


	2. The Moment I Saw You

**So, this story was _meant_ to be a one-shot, but after reading some of the reviews I had an idea of how I could continue it. I originally planned for this chapter to have more in it, making it a two-shot, but instead it's going to be a three-shot. The next chapter is in the works.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own the Mortal Instruments or any of the characters. Those belong to the amazing Cassandra Clare. I just own the plot.**

* * *

"Please!" Magnus cried, melodramatically throwing his hands over his face. "Stop with the sappy looks! It's sickening! My poor eyes!"

Alec rolled his eyes at his boyfriend's histrionics whilst Jace just snorted. "You've put up with it thus far, Magnus," Jace replied. "According to you lot, we've been giving each other these looks for months. What changed?"

"Seeing two of my friends trying to suck each other's faces off can change my perspective of things." Magnus stated clearly. Clary blushed at the description and Jace sent her a devilish smirk. "Excuse me if now every time one of you lovesick idiots sends another disgustingly lovey dovey glance at the other, I can't get the image out of my head. It's burned into my retinas." He doubled over, and pretended to wretch. "And especially when you send it _back_."

"I think," Alec butted in, before his boyfriend could get any further with his theatrical wailing, "that what Magnus is trying to say, is that you two should head over somewhere private - preferably not the bathroom-" he added with a grimace, "-to, um, _discuss_ where you now stand."

"That wasn't what I was saying at all."

"You were practically begging them to get out of your sight. How it this any different?"

Clary ducked her head, stifling a giggle with the back of her hand. When she glanced up at Jace he raised an eyebrow at her, his own smile playing across his lips.

"Okay, but seriously," Isabelle said, rising gracefully to her feet. "You two - get in the kitchen. Simon didn't trick you two into spending over half an hour in the bathroom on your own just so you could kiss - albeit with frightening passion - and then simply return to that painfully awkward phase where you were both oblivious."

Clary's mouth dropped open. She tilted her head and turned to shoot Simon an accusatory look. "What?" He asked, shrugging, but the smirk he wore said he knew that she was plotting one hundred and one ways of getting back at him.

"Move," Isabelle reiterated, breaking her out of her racing thoughts. Too late though; a plan was already blossoming in Clary's mind. "Shoo. Go. . . talk about your feelings. I totally won't be listening in."

.

.

.

"Ummmmmm."

"So."

"This is awkward."

"I hate Izzy."

Clary laughed, shaking her head. Instead of going to the kitchen, as Izzy had so courteously asked them to, Jace had led the two of them upstairs to the guest bedroom. She wasn't sure why, but she suspected it was to wind up Isabelle, and if it was then she applauded him. "What does she expect us to say?" She voiced her thoughts aloud. "Hi, I like you, why did you kiss me?"

" _I_ kissed _you_?" Jace cut in then, slightly incredulously. "You kissed me!"

She attempted to raise an eyebrow at him, then, remembering the disastrous face she'd made earlier with her efforts, settled for raising two. "I did not! It was you!"

"Was not!"

"Was to!"

"We're bickering like toddlers," Jace commented dryly, eliciting a laugh from the both of them. "This is getting us nowhere." She nodded in agreement. "We _both_ kissed each other. There. Now. . ." He trailed off, and for a moment she was concerned he'd forgotten what he was about to say, when he smiled wickedly, and the heavy sense of apprehension pooled in her stomach.

"Whatever you're about to say, why do I have the feeling I won't like it?" She asked cautiously, eyes narrowed and head slightly turned away so she could only see him in her peripheral vision.

He ignored her question, and instead skipped to his original sentence. "What was that about you liking me?

She groaned in horror, and put her face in her hands. "I hate you."

"You love me."

"I never said that." She took her hands off of her face and tilted her head back as she grimaced. "Okay. . . Since you don't seem able to speak about a serious matter for more than two seconds, I'll go first." She took a deep breath, and looked him dead in the eye, so intensely she tell the difference between the blaze of tawny yellow like a lion's coat, and the darker lattice of amber worked over the top. "I like you."

She noticed the way his breath hitched ever so slightly, and how something in his sarcastic mask seemed to crack. But she barrelled on regardless of it. "As in, a romantic way. And I kissed you because I wanted to. But what I said earlier today when you asked me if I was attracted to you was true. I _don't_ just look at a pretty face. And it was also true that as of then, I hadn't realised I liked you. But somehow with the sparse sporadic words you've said to me over the years, and the absolutely _minute_ shreds of kindness you showed me, you had me crushing on you like an idiot. I just didn't know it, until that moment in the bathroom where I came to terms with the fact that I _wanted_ you to kiss me." She took a deep breath. "And you did. Your turn."

"That was quite a speech, Red," he said evasively, and she narrowed her eyes at him.

"A) For the last time, don't call me 'Red'. B) As I said, it's _your turn_."

"Do I really have to pour my heart out to you, like you just did?" He whined, raising him chin and looking at her, frustrated, down his nose.

"Yes."

"Okay, then." A pause. "I guess I realised I liked you the moment I saw you in that blouse."

A beat. " _Huh?_ "

He huffed, half irritation, half laughter. "You heard me. I always knew you were pretty-" Cue the head to toe blush that swarmed her body "-but when you walked in to the dining room wearing something as nice as _that_ , then you start teasing me for not being able to tie a balloon like you don't know I'm only staring at it to keep myself from staring at you, well. . . it was certainly enlightening."

Clary looked down, fingering the hem of the garment. The tiny embroidered birds were tiny textured bumps against her fingers. "I bought this for Isabelle, because she asked me to and it was part of my birthday present to her. Why would this be any more attractive than anything else?"

He chuckled. "Of course; _Isabelle_. She picked it out. I should have known." At Clary's baffled look, he elaborated. "I let slip to her a little while ago that my favourite colours were dark blue, and dark green," he explained, looking her up and down, eyes lingering on the emerald birds near the collar. "And as for why it's anymore attractive than anything else: well, other than that, it isn't. It's just that when I first looked up in the dining room, it was quite dim in there, and it was like looking at some sort of perfectly carved moving marble statue coming towards me, what with your pale skin and the colour of the blouse, and the tiny birds looking like cracks. It just struck me then; I don't know why. It just did."

Clary opened and closed her mouth, speechless. Jace looked up from where he'd been fixated on her feet and surveyed her state with amusement. "So. . ." He began. "Clarissa Fray, will you be my girlfriend?"

Clary's eyes widened to the size of the algae-filled pond in the Lightwoods' garden, and her face decided to attempt that tomato impression again, but she nodded. Slowly at first, then with more vigour. "Um, yeah," she said, ever articulate. "By all means."

A moment of silence. "Are we supposed to kiss now, or what?"

Jace shrugged. "No idea."

"Well."

Another moment of silence.

Even before it happened, she spotted Jace's eyes flick down to her lips.

"Screw it." He said, then lunged at her, capturing her lips with his.

* * *

"What do you think they're doing up there?" Simon asked, flicking his eyes to the ceiling.

Isabelle waved it off. "Kissing, most likely."

.

.

.

When neither of them could breathe, and both their lips were so swollen they resembled sausages, they broke apart. Jace walked backwards and fell onto the spare bed with a sigh, arms outstretched.

Now that the situation was less awkward, Clary's mind returned to the thought that had flitted through it before they'd left to have their _little chat._

"Jace?" She said, coming round to stand over him.

"Hmm?" He hummed in response, cracking one eye open to fix on her.

She sat on the edge of the bed. "You know Isabelle?"

He drew himself up onto his elbows. "Yes, I do know Isabelle. Tall, dark haired, shrieks like those mandrakes from _Harry Potter_?"

Clary laughed. "I meant, you know that you said you told Isabelle that your favourite colours were blue and green?" As she spoke she pointed at the birds on her outfit that reflected that colour. He nodded. "And you remember that I said she picked this out." Again, he nodded. "And remember how she let slip that Simon purposefully tricked us into spending half an hour in a bathroom on our own?"

"Yes, Clarissa, I remember this. Please get to the point."

She smiled and ruffled his hair affectionately, leaving him with mussed up curls and a disgruntled expression. "Well, I think they might have planned this."

He raised an eyebrow. "Wasn't it your idea to have this surprise birthday party for Isabelle? How could Isabelle have planned and prepared for something to happen at the birthday she wasn't even aware was going to happen at that point?"

"Was it my idea? I can't remember. . ." She began pensively, then shook off the thought. "That doesn't matter. But I fully suspect that Simon let slip to Isabelle by accident that we were having this party, and they concocted their devilish plan.

"Hmm, that's nice," Jace replied dispassionately, holding his arm over his eyes. "And I'd go down and thank them for it, but you're plotting revenge, aren't you?"

She grinned. "Did you know that Izzy has a crush on Simon?"

Jace's brows furrowed at the sudden change of topic. "No, I didn't."

"And did you know that Simon has a crush on Izzy?"

He started smiling too, then. "No, I didn't, but I can see where you're going with this now."

She only smiled wider, and ignored him. "And finally, have you noticed that the bathroom we were previously in not only has a lock on the _inside_ but also a bolt on the _outside_? Or that the key used to lock it from the inside can be faulty sometimes?"

He full on grinned at her then, eyes sparking with the same sense of mischief. He nodded.

"Let's head down there and return the favour."

.

.

.

"Oh no, the lovebirds are back," Magnus groaned the moment Clary and Jace stepped back into the living room. Jace just grinned at him tauntingly and squeezed Clary's hand tighter. Alec looked amused, but vaguely nauseated by the whole incident, whilst Simon looked like he was wondering when Clary's judgement had failed so miserably. Isabelle alone seemed remotely happy for them but fortunately she looked happy enough to compensate for the other three; the wide, toothed grin she wore gave the appearance that someone had stolen the moon and stuck it on her face. "How did it go, oh Romeo?"

"That rhymed," Clary remarked offhandedly, as she lowered herself to sit cross-legged, still clasping hands with Jace. The guy in question sat down in front of the sofa, leaning back against it, and spread his legs so Clary was sitting between them. Isabelle noticed the arrangement, and wrinkled her nose.

"No kidding," Jace replied dryly, earning himself a glare and a half smile from his girlfriend. "But seriously, Magnus. Stop this 'Romeo' nonsense. What, do expect me climb onto Clary's balcony at night and hope her brother doesn't catch me?"

"If it weren't for the fact that I don't have a balcony," Clary countered, "I'd be offended if you didn't." That coaxed a chuckle out of several of them. "As it is, you're in the clear."

"Note the unspoken words: _for now_ ," Simon chipped in, and Jace glowered to hide his insecurity. Honestly, if Clary hadn't laughed then, he would have thought the boy was serious.

As it was, he simply growled a, "Shut up, Lewis," and sat in a stony silence as his girlfriend laughed at him again.

"Seriously, Clary," Isabelle looked at the redhead sternly. "I expect you to spill exactly what happened by the time the night is out."

Smirking, Clary replied, "I wouldn't expect anything less." A slight laughter followed, but Jace wasn't paying attention to that.

Now Clary had told him, flat out, presumably having heard it from one or the other themselves, Jace took to observing the interactions between Simon and Isabelle to see if he could spot the mutual, so called 'crush'. At first, when he originally started his observations, it seemed like an impossible idea. They were so comfortable around each other. They were so obviously friends.

But then he started noticing the tiniest details. How when Isabelle laughed at a retort Clary had made to her teasing, and the raven-haired girl tipped her head back to bury her face in Simon's shoulder, shaking with laughter, Simon would go the slightest bit stiff and awkward. How when Simon spoke, Isabelle would give him her full, undivided attention, eyes roving over his face with an intensity Jace hadn't realised the carefree girl possessed. How, though they sat next to each other on the carpet, there was always at least an inch of space between their arms, and when one shifted so that space lessened, the other's breathing would hitch infinitesimally - unnoticeable, unless you knew what you were looking for.

Jace sat back once he'd concluded his observations and decided that Clary was, indeed, correct about those two. This now meant that the two of them could get a measure of revenge on the matchmakers.

He grinned at the thought.

* * *

"Have you noticed that Jace seems to be staring at us a bit?" Simon murmured in Isabelle's ear. She suppressed a shiver at his proximity.

"Maybe he's attracted to you," Isabelle whispered back, flicking her hair over her shoulder to draw attention away from her moving lips; contrary to what Simon clearly thought, she _had_ noticed Jace's gaze flitting over them - she just didn't know what it meant. Unfortunately her casual gesture had the least desired effect: her lock of hair whipped Simon in the nose, making him hurriedly draw back until she could no longer feel his breath along her neck. "I always suspected that his constant teasing of your rodentish features and his fondness for one night stands was a way of covering up that he was attracted to his best friend's little sister's cr-" she cut herself off before she could say crush, _"-friend._ "

She surveyed Simon in her peripheral vision, and saw him scrunch up his nose. " _Rodentish_?" He asked, and Isabelle drew in a breath when he didn't ask the question in the indignant tone he graced Jace with, but one of genuine bemusement. "Is that even a word?"

Isabelle smirked. "I think I'm marvellously remarkable enough to deserve to invent a word and have it recognised in the English dictionary."

"So you go with rodentish? Really?"

"It describes you doesn't it?" She asked, examining her nails blithely, so she missed the miniscule widening of the eyes Simon performed. "What do you think the odds are that with enough pester power, I could actually get them to put that in. Then keep using the word until it catches on."

"Absolutely astronomical, Izzy," Simon replied solemnly. When her heart skipped, she wasn't sure if it was the nickname, or the crooked smile that he sent her that was plaguing her. "But you excel at defying the odds, don't you? I'll bet you'll get it in by the end of the year."

"See if you can find a sucker that'll take that bet, then you're on." Izzy stretched her long fingers and turned her hands over several times, inspecting them meticulously all so she wasn't tempted to look up at Simon. He'd be able to read her like a billboard.

"Isabelle?" Clary said, looking at her quizzically. "Did you hear me?" At Isabelle's shaking head, she repeated herself. "Do you want to grab some food?"

The girl instantly perked up. If it was food Clary wanted, she would get up and get it herself. No, Clary wanted the pleasure of her company. But if she wanted to talk to her, she could do it in front of the others. Unless she meant. . . "Only if you're ready to spill."

Clary gave that signature smile she always gave Isabelle, a seamless blend of fondness and exasperation. "I get the feeling that I'll either spill, or be interrogated until I do."

* * *

Jace watched the girls' retreating backs. And so it began.

.

.

.

"Alright, so what happened between you and Jace?" Isabelle gushed, the moment the door to the dining room swung shut behind them. "And I mean in the bathroom as well, right through to your little 'talk'." She waggled her eyebrows.

Clary put her face in her hands as she felt the blush consume her fair skin, and idly wondered whether revenge was worth this intense grilling. She dismissed the thought instantly; she would get the grilling anyway, and with their plan, she got something out of it. "I cannot believe you just did that." She forced out through gritted teeth.

When she deigned to look back up, Isabelle wore a transparent mask of innocence. "Did what?" She asked, chin held high and eyes glued to the ceiling, looking uncannily like how Clary had always imagined Lucifer looked when he spoke to the angel who guarded the garden of Eden. "And you're not getting out of this by acting all embarrassed," she added.

Clary huffed, but let it slide. "Okay, so evidently we were in the bathroom together - initially with Simon," she added hastily. She could practically sense the knowing smirk as it formed on Isabelle's carved lips. "Then Maryse came and Simon left, and we left the door unlocked after that."

"Then what?" Isabelle continued, eyes wide in anticipation. Did she think she was watching a soap opera or something?

"Then we talked some more just to pass the time, then I ended up falling over-"

"As usual." Isabelle cut in. Clary glared.

"-and Jace kneeled to the side of me to see if I was alright. Then I sat up a bit too fast and bashed heads with him, and suddenly our faces were really close." Isabelle appeared to have stopped breathing. Clary was mildly concerned for her friend's health. "And I guess you were right, maybe there was sexual tension-" Izzy breathed then; after all, she naturally needed air to squeal so loudly Clary grimaced. "-because suddenly we were kissing, and we kind of winged it from there."

Isabelle pressed her hand against her chest. "I feel so proud." She whispered. She even added the glisten of tears to her entirely overdramatic performance.

"Shut up," Clary mumbled, tilting her head forwards so her red hair hid her even redder face. But a part of her was plotting for how to bring up the rather vital part of hers and Jace's plan.

Turns out, she didn't need to. Because Isabelle caught at her wrist and used her free hand to unravel Clary's curled fingers. She inspected her nails thoroughly, tutting in disapproval. "Now that you've got a boyfriend, Clary," Isabelle began, "you _have_ to let me have total control of your wardrobe. You need to look nice for Jace! And that starts," she examined Clary's nails again, "with letting me paint your nails!"

Clary, shocked not only by Isabelle's vehemence, but by how perfectly the circumstances were tuning to what she needed, only nodded, speechless. Isabelle rambled on.

"And maybe whilst I'm at it I'll put some of that stuff that's supposed to help them grow on them; you've bitten them down to the quick. Yes." Isabelle looked resolved. "Meet me in the living room. I just need to get my nail polish out of the bathroom."

"Um, Iz," Clary squirmed. "Could we not do it on the carpet, in the living room? Remember how that turned out last time. Maryse wasn't too happy. And I get you're an expert but. . . even the steadiest hand can be jogged."

Isabelle nodded brightly, but winced at the memory. "Right. Okay. Let's head to the bathroom, then."

Clary nodded, trying to seem totally on board. "Okay. Let me just. . ."

Isabelle didn't - to Clary's utter surprise - roll her eyes. She gave a knowing smile, waved her hands in a shooing motion, and said, "Go. Go see lover boy. Then I get you to myself."

"Bossy." Clary teased. She let Izzy leave the room first, pretending to grab some food for herself and Jace, then took the plate out to the living room, where she ducked in just in time to see Simon excuse himself and leave.

Fortunately, he didn't see her.

* * *

"Alright," Simon turned to Jace as soon as they heard the distinctive thud of the dining room door closing behind the girls. "Talk."

Jace rolled his eyes and slouched, bored. "Is this supposed to be some sort of big brotherly half welcoming, half threatening speech, where you tell me that I'm a dead man walking if I hurt her, because you'll kill me?" He asked. The sarcasm in his voice practically dwarfed the amount of oxygen in the room. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Magnus and Alec get up and leave, apparently to a place with far less teenage drama in the atmosphere.

Simon scoffed. "This is that talk, but it's more of a warning to say that if you hurt her, Clary will kill you herself. With a variety of weapons." Simon was starting to fidget now, though Jace wasn't sure whether it was from agitation or the large bottle of water he'd seen him consume before he came up with the bright idea of hiding in the bathroom. Simon kept talking, despite his restlessness. "And I think everyone knows there's no way I could take you in a fight."

"He finally admits it," Jace drawled, with a slow round of applause that was more sarcastic than his voice has been earlier.

Simon ignored him. A lot of people tended to do that. "But even if Clary kills you, burns you alive, and scatters the ashes, her brother will find someway to torture you in the afterlife. Just a heads up. Don't hurt her."

"Jonathan?" Jace inquired, scepticism apparent in his raised eyebrow, and coloured in his voice. Simon nodded, still with that grim expression on his face. "Every time I see him at school, he's really sullen, and barely acknowledges her. And now you're telling me he'd try to kill me even if I was already dead?"

Simon's back was to the hallway, so he didn't see when Isabelle passed by. She smirked when she realised what Jace was going through, then was gone. Hopefully to the place Clary had intended to send her.

"That's exactly what I'm saying." Jace - in his shock - had a dark suspicion that his face was akin to someone who'd just discovered that the sky was purple and made of hedgehogs. Simon shifted so his foot resided between his legs. Jace raised an eyebrow; it definitely wasn't agitation causing him to fidget. "Yeah, Jon's a little antisocial. But he loves Clary. When you meet him, don't insinuate otherwise. It won't end well."

"Noted."

Clary came in then. Jace raised an eyebrow at her in inquiry and she nodded. Jace turned his attention back to the oblivious boy in front of him.

"So. . ." Simon shifted position _again_. "Anything else I need to address?"

"No. And seriously, if you need the toilet, just _go._ Quit fidgeting so much."

Simon blushed a bright red, muttering a quick "Excuse me," then was gone. He didn't notice Clary, who smirked at Jace. He smirked back.

They both followed Simon round to the bathroom, unseen, and leapt into action the moment the door closed. Jace stepped forwards quietly - knowing enough to not trust Clary with anything that required subtlety and grace - and tiptoed outside the door. He heard Isabelle's questioning "Clary?" then fumbled with the bolt, sliding it home swiftly and silently just as he registered Simon's awkward stuttering as the boy twisted round to try and exit again. He heard muffled cursing as the door rattled.

But the bolt held firm.

* * *

"I - can't - open - this - damn - door!" Simon cursed, glancing up at Isabelle self-consciously, feeling shame flood his face. How weak was he?

"Here, let me try," Isabelle said, a faint frown creasing her beautiful features. She picked up a hairpin from the small shelf above the sink and jiggled the handle, all the while sliding the hairpin in the crack between the door and the wall, around the place the keyhole was. She tested the key, turning it this way and that, but the door didn't budge.

She cursed, sliding the pin into her hair. "That usually works. The lock can be faulty, which is why we keep the hairpin in here. But that has never failed before." She frowned again, then her brow cleared. Then she scowled again. "You said you locked the door whilst you were in here with Jace and Clary, didn't you?"

Simon nodded, his tongue shrivelling up and drying at the irritated glower Isabelle gave him.

"That was probably it! Don't lock the door. It just makes it unpredictable, and now we might not get out." She huffed, blowing a lock of hair out of her face. He tracked the progress of the strand until it fell into the rest of her perfectly arranged hairstyle.

"Can you open it from the other side?" Simon asked meekly, looking down.

Isabelle snapped her fingers, and had him looking back up in surprise. "You can!" She exclaimed. "And Clary's meant to be coming in here in a few minutes. She can let us out!"

"Unless she thinks we purposefully locked her out from this side," Simon mused pensively. Apparently Isabelle didn't appreciate his pessimism, because she fixed him with another glare.

"Don't be so depressing! Of course she'll let us out! We just have to be patient." Her tone was vehement.

"Great. Waiting. Wonderful."

* * *

"I'm not going to let them out. Not for a while, at least."

 **Sizzy next chapter!**

 **Review?**


	3. And Again

**I just want to say thanks to everyone who has reviewed followed and favourited so far! You are all amazing!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own The Mortal Instruments, just the idea of trapping them in a bathroom and forcing them to go from there.**

 **And the final chapter. . .**

* * *

"How long has it been?" Simon asked anxiously, glancing around the room like a rat caught in a dark box it didn't know how to get out of.

Isabelle huffed an indignant sigh, leaning her head back against the wall. "How am I supposed to know, Simon?" She snapped back irritatedly. "You're the one with the watch that's making that infernal ticking noise."

Simon's hand came up to cover said watch in an unconscious gesture of defence, before he listened intently. Sure enough, the normally quiet ticking - though muffled by his hand - bounced off of the walls and was uncomfortably loud. "Compliments on your bathroom's acoustics," Simon muttered, but the annoyed comment he was about to follow up with dried in his throat at Isabelle's scorching glare.

He swallowed, then ducked his head apologetically.

"So how long has it been?" Isabelle asked, her tone slightly softer, but still with a wire of exasperation threaded through it.

Simon glanced down and squinted against the light bouncing off of the glass surface. "Um, ten minutes," he got out. Now the situation was sinking in, the realisation slapped him in the face and pierced his thoughts like a striking cobra. He was stuck in a _bathroom_ with _Isabelle Lightwood._

Was it hot in here all of a sudden? It felt hot. And there was clearly a shortage of oxygen. That was the only reason he was panting, and his heart pounding like he just ran a marathon. He swallowed.

Water. He needed water.

He strode over to the sink, his sudden action clearly startling Izzy, who raised an inquisitive eyebrow at him. He ignored it as he twisted the tap and filled his hands, trying to slurp up the liquid and getting half of it down his shirt in the process. Oh well; it was cooling him down anyway.

"Simon?" Came Isabelle's quizzical voice. He turned to see her lovely face grimacing in confusion, and he winced internally. His cheeks probably resembled the inside of a volcano. "What are you doing?"

"I thought it was hot it here," he rambled, thought that didn't make sense, because why was he shivering? "And I got really thirsty."

Isabelle pursed her lips and as always her disapproval hit him like a freight train, but then she bent over with a short laugh and said through her giggles, "You're such a dork."

His face still surely resembled the belly of a volcano, but his ears turned pink for an entirely different reason.

There was silence for a few of Simon's still frantic heartbeats, before Isabelle asked, "Has it really been ten minutes?"

He checked his watch. "Thirteen now."

Her lips pressed together again, and her nose scrunched up. "I swear it was _not_ meant to take this long. . . Clary said she'd be in here in a second." She paused, then laughed. "That make out session she was going to have with Jace must be _very_ heavy indeed."

The water he'd just drank seemed to resurface at the back of his throat as he gagged. "I do not need to know that, Iz," he said. "Clary's like a sister to me. I have drawn the line at Rebecca swooning to me over her boyfriends, and I know for a fact that Clary thinks that when Jon finally gets a girlfriend she'll keep well away from the details. You don't say that to siblings."

"Jace is like my brother," Isabelle pointed out, but she seemed slightly more relaxed than she had been earlier. He'd amused her: there was a slight curl at the edge of her mouth, and a touch of singsong laughter to her voice.

"Perhaps, but you're barely bothered by _anything_. You're like some sort of goddess. That, and you're the ultimate matchmaker. You don't care if someone gives to the details; in fact, you pester it out of them."

She flicked her hair in a mock self-flattering motion, and batted her eyelashes. However, her raven hair covered her face for the split second in which she wore her shy smile, so he missed it. She ducked her head to look at her bare feet, and smiled at him again through her lashes. Not a grin, not a smirk, but a real smile.

He felt a warm glow in his chest.

* * *

"Isabelle's smiling goofily right now," Clary informed Jace in a whisper.

"Shut up, I'm trying to listen."

* * *

Isabelle, in swift decisive movements that were about as different from Clary's clumsy motions as one could get, delicately perched on the side of the bathtub, leaving Simon to slide down the wall until he was sitting on the floor opposite her. It didn't escape his attention that they were in precisely the same positions as Clary and Jace had been when they were in there.

The moment the thought flitted across his mind, he regretted it. He glanced at the spot of floor where he'd seen Clary and Jace lying and kissing when he'd walked in earlier that day, and shuddered. He scrunched his eyes shut.

That was _not_ an image he wanted in his head at this time.

"It's a shame really," Isabelle said, and Simon snapped his head up, so grateful that the image of Isabelle Lightwood was enough to burn out the last few sparse lingering traces of the horrible image previously burnt into his retinas.

"Huh?" He asked articulately, wondering if she'd said something he'd missed and instantly feeling ashamed.

Isabelle didn't look fazed, or like she'd even heard him. She just continued examining her nails with a sigh, like she was talking to herself. "It's a shame really. I was looking forward to getting to paint someone _else's_ nails for once. I mean, I could do it on myself," she eyed the vials of nail varnish where they stood to attention on the small ledge like soldiers clad in bright uniforms. "But my current nail colour was done so perfectly, and I don't want to ruin them."

She stretched her hands and Simon saw what she meant: they were perfectly done with a shade of dark red that matched the ruby pendant she always kept tucked round her swan-like neck. The nails were long and slender, but smooth and sanded in a perfect curve. Tiny gold plastic jewels made patterns on them. One in particular that Simon recognised was an _enkeli_ rune from the book series he and Clary had been briefly obsessed with a few weeks ago. In fact, as he swept his gaze over them a second time, they were all the runes from said series.

It was touching, he thought, that Isabelle, despite not sharing their passion for the series, had shown her support through her cosmetics. She loved her friends, just in a more subtle, harder to read way.

And there was that bitter word again: _friends._

Simon scratched his head, feeling ashamed of himself for not being able to prevent himself from speaking, and opened his mouth to say, "You could paint my nails if you want."

Isabelle's mouth dropped open.

One second.

Two seconds.

Three seconds.

Four seconds.

Five seconds.

"You. Would. Like. Me. To. Paint. Your. Nails?" She asked, and in her tone was the same echoing disbelief that was written all over her face.

Very slowly, cursing his masochism all the way, he nodded, sure that he'd just sold his soul.

Only to have his gesture responded to with a squeal so deafening a banshee would be proud. Isabelle's shocked face melted into a beaming grin so wide Simon was concerned the skin at the corners of her lips would split. Then she was jumping up and down clapping, and Simon found that he couldn't regret whatever word vomit he'd just spewed, because it made her that happy.

He grimaced at the thought.

He was so screwed.

* * *

There was a deafening silence, broken only by Isabelle's shrieks. The two could hear them even without pressing their ears to the cracks of the door, and Clary winced in sympathy for Simon's ears.

Jace mouthed at her ' _whipped'_.

* * *

"Okay," Isabelle said, once she'd quieted down, uncertainty lacing her voice like she thought he would change his mind. "If you're sure."

Simon mentally kicked himself. Hard. Between the legs.

But the words fell out of his mouth anyway. "I'm sure." Because he couldn't deny that part of him - that fairly significant part of him - that just wanted to make her happy. "Knock yourself out."

He was rewarded for his stupidity - several times over - though, when her face burst into the widest grin he'd ever seen, as bright and brilliant and breath-taking to behold as the curve of the Earth. He grinned back, and then she swarmed him, instructing him in a sharp voice to sit, to take off his shoes, to spread his fingers. Then she was delicately leaping over him to open the bathroom cupboard and pull out a small transparent plastic bag that seemed to hold every shade of nail varnish under the sun.

She turned to Simon, and despite the undampened look of sheer delight on her face, her enthusiasm was starting to scare him a bit. He now empathised with Clary, and how many times she must have gone through this.

"Okay," she said, once they were both in a position she deemed suitable, with Simon's back to the wall and his legs bent so his feet lay flat on the floor, and with her sitting cross-legged opposite him, his knees forming a barrier between them. She twirled the thin handle to the bag round her finger, then dug around in it to pull out five small bottles: one a dark green, one a rich red, one a pale shell pink, one what looked like somewhere between bronze and gold, and one that was an attractive violet. "So, these are five colours that I got recently, and the whole reason I wanted Clary as a guinea pig was so I could test out what they actually looked like once dry. So which one do you want to test?"

Simon shook his head in bewilderment. "I don't know. . . Um. . . You decide," he cemented finally.

Isabelle raised an eyebrow. "You sure?" She said with a laugh, and there was wickedness in her face that promised nothing good for him, but again he damned himself for being a masochist and nodded, very very _very_ slowly.

Then he spouted the most untrue statement in the world (at least on this, rather small and insignificant, scale): "I trust you."

* * *

"He is _so_ going to regret that. He probably already is."

"Shut up for the last time! Ow! Don't elbow your boyfriend!"

* * *

Isabelle's grin only grew. "Okay then," she said calmly, gently picking up the green one and unscrewing the top. "Let's go."

He swallowed surreptitiously, even as she brought the brush up to his right hand, which was clamped in her left with an iron grip. The glide of the bristles over his nail was silent and smooth, yet he still held his breath for some strange reason. He relaxed as she lifted her hand to do a second coating, eyeing the colour critically, then blowing on it slightly.

Once the pink disc was painted green, giving the impression Simon had moss growing from his cuticles, Isabelle dropped his right hand and transferred her attention to his left. Simon wondered briefly why she'd only painted the nail on the fore finger before moving on, but his swallowed his protests, uncertain as to whether he would make it worse for himsef by arguing.

He dimly wondered why he was treating Isabelle like someone who might explode if she didn't get her way, but then he thought back to those amusing days when he'd seen her trying to persuade Clary to wear whatever item of clothing she'd deemed suitable. He decided that going up against that stubborn fire wasn't worth the bother. He'd get torched either way.

So he didn't argue when she gently but firmly encircled his left wrist with her long fingers, like she couldn't bear to be this close or touching him but acknowledged it was necessary to hold his hand still. The fingers gripping the brush shuddered slightly, a single drop of varnish falling to the floor like an emerald tear.

"So," Isabelle remarked cheerfully, and it was a cheer that remained violently at odds with her subtle discomfort as she swallowed against the silence. A slight sting emanated in Simon's chest. Did she not like being around him? He'd already suspected she only put up with him for Clary's sake. . . "How does it feel to see Clary with Jace?"

The question took him by surprise, and he stammered back. "How is it supposed to feel? I guess I'm happy for her, relieved that they're out of that painfully ignorant stage where they each threw alternating looks at each other, and slightly disgusted at the image of them making out on the floor right over _there._ " He nodded at the tainted spot. "I can't get it out of my head. It was like watching Rebecca do something like that."

Isabelle raised one thin dark eyebrow. "I would've thought it would bother you more than mere disgust. More like jealousy." Her voice trembled ever so slightly on the word, as though she was realising how little she understood about him.

"No," he laughed out. "Not jealousy. I mean, I loved Clary once, but now I think I loved the _idea_ of her. She was pretty and she was kind and she was dependable and _safe_. I guess I wanted to be able to trust the person I was in a relationship with, and always be able to understand what was going on."

"What changed?" She asked tentatively.

 _You came._

He wanted to say it, but he held his tongue. Jace had always been there, gazing obliviously at Clary when neither of them would notice, and she had always been there to gaze back. He'd known it even back then, and had hated the boy for it. If anything, that was what had sparked their passive aggressive hostility towards each other.

But then the Lightwoods had come to the school. Isabelle had made firm friends with Clary almost immediately, and Alec with Jace just as quickly, so there was less time for verbal sparring. Isabelle had been the first one to call Simon out on the futility of his infatuation, and slowly, unbeknownst to her, she'd been the one to help him get over it.

But he didn't say that. Instead, he admitted, "I've accepted that I love her like a sister - an annoying, short, stubborn little sister - and I guess I'll embrace love when it comes, as dangerous and unsafe as it may be."

Because Isabelle was nothing if not explosive.

The girl in question wore a small smile on her face as the tension in her shoulders eased, and Simon felt the sting in his chest dissipate to nothing at the softness in her usually sharp face. "That's beautiful," she said candidly. "Don't worry, I'm not going to start blubbering because it's just so touching and meaningful etcetera, etcetera. But it's true. Whoever you fall for is a lucky girl, even if she doesn't reciprocate your feelings."

Ignoring the fact that those words could potentially be a bad omen, Simon let them fill him with warmth. "Thanks," he said hesitantly. He paused, then barged onwards with that awkward tactlessness Clary and Isabelle had called him out on so many times. "Now I've spilled my soul, it's your turn."

She immediately tensed. "What?" She asked, wariness crawling around in her voice. Then she seemed to calm down and replied blithely, "What do you want to know?"

Simon shrugged, as though the gesture of casualness and normalcy might make him act normal. "I dunno. . . Who was your first crush?"

She turned bright red, and mumbled something unintelligible.

"What was that?" She looked just about ready to die of mortification - an astronomically strange look on her - so Simon tried to soften the atmosphere with a joke. "I apologise for the fact I don't have vampire hearing, could you repeat it?"

She smiled wanly, then admitted in a tone he still had to lean in to catch, "The Artful Dodger."

* * *

"What did she say?" Jace whispered. "I can't hear."

"I didn't hear either, but I know the answer." His girlfriend replied.

" _How?!"_

"She told me once."

"It sounds embarrassing. Tell me."

"No."

" _Tell me!"_

"Shut up and listen. Simon might let something slip if you're that desperate."

He huffed, but acquiesced.

* * *

Simon's eyes practically bugged out of his head. "You. . . _what?_ "

A faint pink blush brushed her cheeks as she looked down, her unbound hair falling forwards to shield her face like it understood how much she wanted to hide in that moment. "You heard me. That guy Dodger from _Oliver Twist._ "

"Why?"

She shrugged, tilting her head back; some of the blush had receded until it was just a memory as her face was revealed again and she regained her confidence. "Does anyone know why they have their first crush? He was smart, and he was friendly."

"He was also fictional."

She shrugged again. "As a kid, you don't care. You and Clary talk about those picture books and the people in them like they're real."

"It's called Manga."

"Whatever you say, Simon. Whatever you say."

He mock scowled at her, but she kept looking at him with that innocent gleam to her eyes and his frustration dissolved into bubbles of laughter, floating up his windpipe and turning the corners of his mouth up in a smile. There was a brief silence.

"Iz?"

"Hm?"

"How long do you think we'll be in here?"

A sigh. "I don't have a clue."

"Because sooner or later they'll have to notice we're missing." Simon pointedly out, half logic and half hope.

Isabelle snorted, jerking her hand at the sound and accidentally painting Simon's knuckles bright red, like she'd slashed a wound there, or dragged a cylinder of scarlet lipstick across his hand. "Hate to break it to you, Si, but Clary and Jace, and Alec and Magnus can get _pretty distracted_ when they're alone together."

Simon's shoulders slumped. "We're never getting out of here."

"Not to mention the fact that Mum and Dad took Max out earlier today to the shops, so they won't be back for a few hours."

Simon groaned. "Stop! Stop killing my already non-existent optimism!"

"I'm just stating the facts."

A collective sigh reverberated around the room, and Simon gave up on the argument. He glanced down. "Are you done ye-" The sight dried the words in his throat. "Isabelle," he said through gritted teeth. "Why does it look like a unicorn pooped rainbows onto my hands?"

The girl only grinned.

The devil.

She'd used _all five_ colours. The green had only been the start. Now two his ten fingernails were emerald, two crimson, two lilac, two gold, and two coral. She turned his hand into a freaking colour wheel.

"I _told you_ I wanted to test out all of the colours!" She defended. "I wanted to see what they looked like once dry! And you're the one who agreed to this! Why on earth are you so angry?"

* * *

The redhead and the blonde listening at the door were silently laughing too hard to make a comment, even when Alec and Magnus cast them strange looks.

* * *

She was right. Why _was_ he so angry? After all, he was the idiot who'd volunteered for this. She'd told him what was going to happen - and he should know anyway, considering all the horror stories Clary had told him about a makeover at Isabelle's hands.

And true, Eric and the rest of his band mates were so going to tease him for this. True, this was the most emasculating thing that had ever happened to him. True, he had no idea how long it would take before this varnish would fade.

But he'd done what she wanted, hadn't he? He'd brought it on himself.

He groaned, then leaned back and tilted his hand to bang it against the tiled bathroom wall. He was so _whipped._

"You okay?" Isabelle asked with amusement.

"Fine," he scraped out, his eyes half shut. "Absolutely perfect." The syllables were clipped and meticulously picked apart in his mouth. He lifted his lids a fraction to observe Isabelle's confused - and was that hurt? - expression. To his annoyance, his heart stuttered in his chest.

"You don't have to lie to me, you know," she said, and her voice was suddenly harder, slightly offended. He watched through his eyelashes as she drew herself up imperiously and huffed like a peacock with ruffled feathers. "You can just tell me if you don't like it, then I'll take it off. I told you, I just wanted to test it was the right colour. You don't have to treat me like I'm made of glass. I won't break."

"I know you won't," he hastened to reassure her. "I just didn't want to disappoint you."

A pause. A breathless pause. "Oh." Came the faint sigh, like the breath had been knocked out of her with a soft thud. She swallowed, then smiled. It was barely an awkward flash of teeth, but it warmed his core anyway, and seemed to give off a pure light - one that was a far cry from the innocence (or lack thereof) of the beautiful girl in front of him. "Well then thanks, I guess. That's really sweet."

And though she couldn't possibly know it, with those words she gently and tenderly sliced his beating heart with long deep gashes, before stepping back to let the blood flow. He felt it seeping into his lungs until he struggled for air, with a shortness of breath that couldn't quite be feigned. The worst part? She didn't realise. She just kept gazing at him with that soft fond look and it gently rubbed to edges of him like sandpaper, until he felt the dust blow away in clouds.

Because Isabelle never dated, or was even remotely interested in, "sweet boys". She preferred the ones that her parents never approved of, and Simon had overheard a conversation between Clary and Izzy where the taller girl confessed that her parents were always so hard on all her earlier boyfriends anyway, scaring them away even when she genuinely liked them. So after a while she just gave up, dating around the place and breaking hearts like it was a hobby, leaving her parents thoroughly disgruntled.

She would never settle for someone as tame as him, not when she had her own fire that couldn't be contained.

But that painful truth didn't stop his mouth from going dry when she laughed, or his heart decide to imitate a rabbit's, or all the world's butterflies to migrate and try to practiced synchronisation in his stomach.

It was beyond frustrating.

"Thanks," he spluttered out quickly and inelegantly, once he realised that they'd been staring into each others eyes for a little too long, and that her comment was one that may require a response.

But her eyes were so pretty. He'd determined that from a distance they looked as black as the sticks of worn down charcoal Clary used to dirty her hands and draw moustaches on his face with at sleepovers - the same shade as Valentine or Jonathan's eyes. But after closer inspection, they were actually a very dark brown, the colour of conkers and chestnuts, superimposed with a complex latticework of lighter brown, like filigree gold.

"Simon," she inquired suddenly. He mentally shook himself. He was acting like a lovesick idiot, and needed to stop. "Are you okay? You kind of. . . spaced out." She cracked a faint smile. "I thought that was Clary's job. You're the one I rely on to keep your head out of the clouds."

"Feet firmly planted in this dimension," he joked, though it was lacklustre. Fortunately, if Isabelle noticed, she didn't show it.

"Yeah. Exactly." Her grin mirrored his: weak. They sat there in a tense silence, Simon's hands trailing down his legs to rest against the cool bathroom tiles. They were so cold. Had they always been that cold? Or was he just really, really, really hot all of a sudden?

He gave a heroic attempt at convincing himself it was the former.

Isabelle cleared her throat. "So. . ." Her first attempt trailed off into nothing but she swung back for another try. That was Isabelle Lightwood for you: not even accepting defeat when it stared her in the face. "Do you actually think Clary's going to come in any time soon?"

"Of course," he replied without hesitation. After all, he thought, how could she not? She may be oblivious, but surely she wasn't _that_ oblivious, right? "I mean, it's only been. . ." He trailed off himself when he glanced down and tilted his wrist, so he could read the time. His heart sank even further than it had when it was drowned in the metaphorical tears from earlier. "Forty minutes."

Isabelle whistled, raising an eyebrow knowingly. "That must be one long make out session."

"For the last time: please don't say things like that in my earshot again. My poor eardrums might just melt from disgust."

"I'm just saying," Isabelle cut in with a laugh. "Clary's a prude. We all know this. So there's no way she and Jace went any further in this short a time. Therefore, why isn't she here to get us out?"

"Because she has better things to do in her life than constantly worry over her idiotic friends who frequently get themselves stuck in a bathroom?" He asked, with the _'duh'_ a ringing resonance in his tone.

"Uh huh." Judging by the terrifying girl in front of him, eyebrow raised sceptically, arms crossed over her chest as she rose to her feet, Isabelle wasn't buying it. "And she's smart too, remember? She's good at figuring stuff out. And fiery. She totally wouldn't want revenge on us - _you_ in particular - for tricking her into wasting thirty minutes in a bathroom."

Simon's normally tan face had gone white. His Adam's apple bobbed unobtrusively. Then he threw himself into a standing position and before he processed what his subconscious had decreed he had strode to the locked door and was pounding on it yelling, "Clary! What did you do?!"

* * *

"What do I do now?!"

"Hell if I know. This is was your idea, sweetheart. You take the consequences."

* * *

"What?!" Came the muffled reply, and Simon's fingers and toes curled in indignation. "What could I have possibly done whilst merely standing outside a locked bathroom with my boyfriend that would justifiably warrant such aggression from my beloved best friend?" Used to Clary's rarely seen overdramatic streak after all these years, Simon pictured her clutching a hand to her heart and staggering backwards with mock anguish on her face. The image made him snort, and he was tempted to keep up the pretence, just to see what new phrases the redhead could come up with.

Isabelle, on the other hand, held no such inhibitions.

In a heartbeat she was pounding on the door. "Let us out!" She demanded, and if Simon looked closely he imagined he could see the fragile capillaries buckling under the force of her knocks, the blood seeping out into a purple bruise that adorned her knuckles like a set of sapphire and amethyst rings. "Let us out, Clarissa, or so help me I will-"

"You can't do much from in there," came a bored drawl that Simon recognised with a fierce scowl. _Jace_. He was in on this?!

"You're in on this?!" Isabelle echoed his thoughts, only pounding harder. Simon half thought he was hallucinating when he saw her wince from pain. The expression was an alien and unwelcome thing on Isabelle Lightwood's face. "How dare you, Jonathan Christopher?!"

Simon raised an eyebrow at the name. Jace was short for Jonathan Christopher? How in Hell did they work that out?

"Evidently." The reply was heavy will sarcasm, practically dripping with it. "But don't forget, Iz, your rat-faced boyfriend tricked me into spending precious time in there as well as Clary." Isabelle's mouth was open, but she didn't go to reply. Simon wondered why. "Life's short, Izzy. I don't want my youth to fly by in a haze of sinks and toilets."

Isabelle snorted then, that ridiculous comment seeming to have reawakened her inner rationalist. "Exactly; life's too short. And it's definitely too short to let you two waste on your _painful_ ignorance, no matter how blissful it may have been for the two of you." She crossed her arms over her chest. "We were doing it out of good intentions. You're doing it out of spite."

At those words, a thought struck him.

Simon's breath caught.

"The road to Hell is paved with good intentions, Iz."

His palms started sweating.

He could practically _see_ the knowing glance the couple exchanged behind that goddamned door.

His heart decided on a reprise at that rabbit imitation.

"Izzy," he said lowly, quiet enough that they couldn't hear. "Come over here a second."

The girl in question cast him an odd glance - part curiosity at his cryptic words, part exasperated by them - but did as he said, until they were both leaning against the wall on opposite sides of the sink, as far away from that unsurpassable door as it was possible to get in this room. Even so, he spoke in a hushed whisper.

"Izzy, you remember our motives for sticking the two of them in this room together for half an hour, right?" A quick nod confirmed what he already knew, but he repeated it anyway. "We wanted them to get together. And we both know that Clary doesn't do things halfway; it's either all or nothing with her." Another nod. "And why would 'revenge' be any different?"

"Why are you using air quotations on the word 'revenge'?" Izzy butted in, but making sure her voice was still a whisper.

Simon look down, and stared down the plughole of the basin for a moment to gather his courage, before he looked back up a swallowed. "I like you, Iz. A lot. Romantically." He admitted in a rush, the air blowing out of his lungs making to words more gush than tune. But he could tell she understood, as her eyes widened and he rushed out, "And Clary knows. She's known for ages. So. . ." He had to pause to make sure he worded this right. "It's possible she had the same motives as us, and was just disguising it as revenge."

At her expression, which Simon's self-conscious side insisted was her unconvinced face, he added, "You said that they're doing this out of spite. But Clary isn't spiteful."

Thankfully, Izzy didn't question it. "So what do we do?" She murmured, leaning forwards until he could feel her breath ghosting over his cheekbones. He gulped surreptitiously - or at least, he hoped it was surreptitious. He shrugged in a non-committal way that he hoped conveyed his lack of suggestion.

Somehow (Simon had his suspicions that Isabelle was just being generous) she picked up on this unspoken message, and he was infinitely glad it was her who made the next suggestion. A pregnant pause, then, "How about we kiss?"

Being said so quietly, with her face in such close proximity to his, lent the words a strange power, an intimacy of sorts, that coaxed a shiver up his spine. Her face was stony, expressionless, and dead serious. She knew how much he was - and would be - affected by this.

He wasn't sure whether to rejoice that his crush was kind enough to do something she had no desire to do because he wanted it (and to get out of confinement, but semantics) or to cry because the cruelty of giving him a taste of what he so desperately wanted before ripping it away, never to be seen again, would hurt so much.

For an instant, he hated Clary. Hated that for her reckless actions, she would wound him like this.

But in the end, he would never - _could_ never - say no to Isabelle.

"Okay," he said.

The reaction wasn't what he'd wanted. She immediately leaned back and stepped into the centre of the room. His feelings must have shown on his face because she smiled faintly and held out a hand in invitation. "They have to have an idea of what's going on," she said, still quiet. "They have to know when to let us out."

A part - a large part - of him recoiled at the idea that she was only doing this for show, as fake as Katniss's feeling for Peeta were when they first started with the act in _The Hunger Games._ But the optimistic, foolish, part of him pointed out where that performance had led.

So he stepped forward, until he was standing right in front of Isabelle in the middle of the bathroom. She had always been a tall girl, but he'd had a growth spurt recently, and whilst that did nothing to lessen the lankiness of his build, it meant he could look her directly in the stunning eyes.

The ones that were fixed on his.

Very slowly, uncertainty burning the pads of his fingers, he reached round Isabelle to connect his hands in a loose embrace that just brushed the small of her back. She smiled slightly, then stepped forward, _closer_ , to let her fingers tangle in the dark curls at the nape of his neck. His glasses were knocked crooked by the close proximity of heir faces, as they drew in breath as one, their lips millimetres apart.

"What are you waiting for? Just do it." She breathed, seemingly as lost in the moment as he was. He spared a moment of pain to consider what an amazing actress she was, before he did as she said.

He kissed her.

* * *

"They're kissing! Finally, they're-"

"If you interrupt this moment, Clarissa, I will kill you myself."

Clary looked up, her gaze focusing in on something unexpected. "Are you _crying_?"

"No." A sniffle. "I just have dust in my eye."

* * *

It was everything and nothing, fire and darkness, falling into some great abyss with the promise that a friend will catch you, but set you down immediately and not carry you away. It was everything Simon had dreamed of and more as their lips moved in sync, hers as soft as two rolled up rose petals, like the contrast between a picture of a landscape, and seeing the landscape with your own eyes, and not being able to think of words powerful enough to describe it.

It was a sunset and a sunrise all at once, with the glory of both scorching from their connected mouths down throughout their bloodstream until Simon's nerves were tingling with it. It was the transition of faith to hope to wish and back again, each stage of that trust blossoming tentatively in his chest like one of the first flowers to brave the crisp springtime. It was being in that famous cradle on the top of the tree from the lullaby, with the thrill of knowing the dangers of his predicament but the peace of feeling the wind and sky and of knowing that you were not alone.

And it was beautiful.

Then their lips disconnected, and the two drew back to gaze into each other's eyes, panting heavily. He watched the flicker of emotions cross Isabelle's beautiful face and at the final look of resignation he squeezed his eyes shut with the naïve hope that if you don't see the knife coming, it won't come. The ribbons of the cradle snapped and he was plummeting, falling fast and furious, his heart a dead cumbersome weight that would drag him to the bottom of the sea and drown him.

With his eyes closed, he couldn't see what was happening next, and couldn't prepare for the impossibility of it occurring.

But he still felt the shift of the air as Isabelle leaned in and kissed him again.

And then he was flying again.

He was so caught up in the sensation - in _her_ \- that he almost missed it as the door swung open to reveal two people, one smiling with pride and the other grimacing, tears in his eyes. He and Isabelle turned, hands sliding down to let their fingers interlock, and he felt something spread from between their palms, like they were holding a burning star between them. They turned in unison to catch the single tear that rolled down Clary's porcelain cheek, to see the moment that Jace cracked and let out a loud sniffle.

Simon just had time to mouth two words at Clary - two words that somehow made her smile widen - before he was spun around and was kissing Isabelle once more. Sometime later he heard the door close as Clary and Jace left but he paid it no heed as they held each other tighter as they kissed again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

Until Simon had two thoughts: that this was definitely worth having his nails painted for, and that not even the angels in Heaven could separate them.

* * *

 **And that's the end of Thirty Minutes and Counting. Sorry if that was too... poetic, at the end. I think I got a bit carried away.**

 **Thanks to everyone who reviewed, followed, and favourited this story, and just generally showed their support. It really means a lot. Thank you all, you amazing people. Never stop being so wonderful!**

 **Special thanks to: sophiecampbellbower, Guest, rami (Guest), 14bubbles, A Brunette Angel, oesteffel, Guest M, BlackHeron104, Author Autumn, It's Kris, Someone (Guest), Debra Williams, sharp039, Percabeth Fairdale, RetroNick, PupPup WoofWoof, Guest (2), Will H. is my bae, and ntlpurpolia for reviewing chapters one and two.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


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